


If I know you, I know what you'll do (you'll love me at once)

by Elisexyz



Series: Febuwhump 2021 (TMFU) [3]
Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: (mostly at least), Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Blood and Injury, Hurt Napoleon Solo, Injury, M/M, Napoleon Solo Whump, Pre-Canon, Pre-Relationship, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 12:40:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28813587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elisexyz/pseuds/Elisexyz
Summary: “You know, if you are trying to kidnap me, you are being awful nice about it.”Or, a strange Russian man saves Napoleon’s life.
Relationships: Illya Kuryakin/Napoleon Solo
Series: Febuwhump 2021 (TMFU) [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2142537
Comments: 26
Kudos: 89
Collections: febuwhump 2021





	If I know you, I know what you'll do (you'll love me at once)

**Author's Note:**

> This is the fill for the "Who are you?" prompt from day 12 of Febuwhump, and it totally could have been up on time but I have been squinting at it for two days instead. Aaaanyway, here it is, hopefully it turned out okay!  
>  The title is from "Once upon a dream" by Lana Del Rey.

Alright, so _perhaps_ making a run for it while injured and unarmed was not his most brilliant idea of the day. He might have had better luck holing up somewhere and hoping not to be found.

But well, damage’s done, and it’s probably a statement to how much of his blood is not where it’s supposed to be that he makes another grave mistake on top of it all: hearing a sound behind him, he turns to check if he is being followed, fast enough that the world does not steady once he’s done turning, and next thing he knows he’s tripping and landing on all fours.

He supposes it’s a good thing that his hands automatically darted forward to break the fall, it wouldn’t have done him much good to land flat on his face, but his bleeding shoulder, having had to bear some of the impact, vehemently disagrees.

Or rather, it _howls_ in pain, dragging a low groan out of him as he tries to breathe through it and get back up.

To go _where_ , that has yet to be decided, and the fact that his plan is currently to just _not die_ is—well, it’s not helping. He’s failing miserably at it, and it doesn’t offer much of an incentive to get back on his feet, especially with all those black dots at the edge of his vision and his aching knees protesting that they don’t feel like running anymore, thanks but no thanks.

He hears footsteps first, gets chocked by panic second and manages to get the man running towards him in semi-focus only third, but hey, it’s something, and there isn’t much that he can do to stop a bullet to his head anyway.

He could try rolling away. Just—letting go, falling down, rolling and rolling until the guy runs out of bullets.

Is it an excuse to just lay down? Possibly, but still.

The man does not shoot him in the head.

Instead, he takes a rather curious approach to murder: he crouches down in front of him, grabbing his arms and pushing him back enough to get the weight off his arm, then he looks at him in the eye, almost giving the impression of giving a damn about him – touching, really –, and announces that he’s going to pull him up.

Napoleon’s brain vaguely registers _Russian_ and _oh, shit, how did this just get worse_ and _this is going to hurt like hell_ , then he’s being pulled on his feet, taking a few ragged breaths through the waves of pain and wondering how he had been _running_ before.

“We have to go,” the man says, moving to his uninjured side and sliding one arm around his waist to better pull him along.

Napoleon doesn’t really want to be kidnapped by the Russians, but given that he is currently not being shot _and_ he’s apparently caught a ride—let’s not look at the gifted horse in the mouth, he can make a run for it later. When he can name more than one part of his body that doesn’t currently hurt.

He does try to keep up with the pace and with what is currently going on, but, to be fair, his kidnapper is doing nothing but cursing under his breath – not much of a conversationalist, it would seem –, and if he were in a slightly less perilous situation he probably would pass out any second now, so he can’t be blamed for getting lost in his head a little.

Enough that he doesn’t realize that they are not alone anymore until he gets gracelessly slammed against a wall. The man steps forward, covering his visual of whomever is shooting at them and firing right back, and, well, Napoleon did just let out a very undignified yelp and he did have to grab a fistful of the guy’s jacket, because the world is spinning and it feels like he’d crumble right to the ground otherwise, but by the end of it he has no additional bullet holes, so. He’d count that as a win.

“Sorry,” the man says, as soon as he’s turned around. He does look and sound rather regretful, and he seems extra gentle as he resumes his place at his side.

“You know,” Napoleon manages to get out, and by then they have already gone back to walking. “If you’re trying to kidnap me, you are being awful nice about it.”

Not that he’s complaining.

“I’m not kidnapping you,” the man says, and literally nothing else. Again, not a great conversationalist, and Napoleon’s brain is too scrambled to compensate right now. Maybe later.

The man leads him to the backdoor of a closed shop, in an alley away from prying eyes. He pulls him towards a chair, to which Napoleon answers by just gracelessly dropping on it, and he grabs a bag from the floor with the certainty of someone who knows what’s inside.

Is this his shop? He didn’t need to force the lock or anything—has he been not-kidnapped by a Russian spy who has been working undercover in a—what kind of shop is this? They are in a storage room mostly filled with closed boxes, he isn’t sure what they sell. Oh, shit, is that a _doll_ on that shelf? That’s so creepy. It’s staring at his soul and probably trying to snatch it away. Tough luck, he’s sold it a few years ago—maybe the doll is possessed by a ghost. He should keep an eye on it, it could—

His not-kidnapper catches his attention by getting his hands all over him, trying to get his clothes out of the way so that he can inspect the wound. Napoleon makes a noise of protest and offense before he can bite his tongue, and the man looks thoroughly unimpressed.

“Keep still,” he says, roughly, like Napoleon has literally _any_ reason in hell to listen to him right now.

Well, he _is_ kinda defenceless _and_ bleeding _and_ maybe if he asks politely Mr Russian will keep him alive long enough to bring him to whomever wanted him not-kidnapped, but still, rude.

He should probably ask him what he wants and what he’s doing, instead as soon as he feels a wave of blinding pain rushing through his arm what comes out is: “What kind of uncivilized place did you come from? If you’re going to torture me, you should at least offer me a drink.”

It's out quickly enough that it leaves him a little out breath – bad sign, he recognizes somewhere in his head, probably the same place where someone is facepalming because he just insulted the man holding his life in his hands right now –, and it doesn’t get much of a reaction. In fact, the man doesn’t so much as _look_ at him, frowning in concentration as he stares at his shoulder.

A moment later, he reaches blindly for the bag and gets out an unlabelled bottle, silently thrusting it in Napoleon’s hand, the one that is currently not twitching reflexively because of a busted shoulder.

“Oh. Thanks,” Napoleon mutters a little too late, dumbfounded and grateful enough that his first instinct is moving to drink. Then, of course, his common sense has the brilliant idea of kicking in, screaming _poison, you idiot_.

Because you shouldn’t let a stranger fix you a drink, right. Too bad.

(Though, really, he’s already half-dead, can he feel any worse? Maybe the poison will knock him out or something. Maybe there’s just some nice, innocent, non-lethal drug in it. Would that be so bad?)

When he takes a brief break from frowning unhappily at the alcohol he can’t take advantage of, he’s met by a pair of very exasperated blue eyes.

(Oh, they are _really_ blue. Really, really blue. Nice.)

The man grabs the bottle, takes a sip, makes a show of swallowing it, and then he thrusts it back into his hand. Napoleon just blinks at him.

“Now, drink,” he says, sounding like he can’t wait to be rid of him. “I am not doing this while you are sober to whine about it.”

Napoleon frowns. “I don’t whine,” it feels important to clarify, but drinking he does.

It—honestly doesn’t help much.

He does keep a decent enough control on the sounds coming out of his mouth, by which he means that he doesn’t start _hollering_ the way he’d undoubtedly want to, but he isn’t sure he lasts that long before he desperately needs to do _something_.

“So, who are you and why are you torturing me?” he asks, feeling only marginally ashamed of the way he has to gasp for breath every two seconds and just praying that Mr Russian will turn out to be more sociable than he seems. He needs a distraction from those stupid _tweezers_ digging into his shoulder, thanks.

“I’m saving your life,” comes the dry answer, the man not even glancing at him. Which is actually a good thing, he doesn’t want him to get anything wrong while he’s digging around his insides. Maybe he should leave him alone. “And I can’t tell you my name.”

“Great, brooding and mysterious,” Napoleon mutters, hissing at a particularly vicious stab of pain. He quickly blinks through the _flames_ that have taken residence in his eyes, trying to not move an inch and take a deep breath at the same time.

A bullet to the head might have been better.

He is never getting shot again. Ever. He’s running away right after this, he’ll live the rest of his life as—as—a barber. Yeah, that’ll do.

“Just know that I’m here to help,” the man says, like it means literally _anything_.

Napoleon snorts. “Right. Of course. That makes sense.”

The silence that follows makes it clear that the man has just about zero intention of giving him an actual explanation.

“Come on,” Napoleon tries again. “I need more than that, my friend.”

The man glances at him, shakes his head slightly, mutters something to himself in what’s probably Russian, then he pointedly doesn’t look at him as he explains: “I _am_ that. Your friend.”

Napoleon almost says that he should at least buy him a beer first, then he remembers that he did offer him a drink, so. Fair.

“From the future.”

Uh.

Not as fair.

“Come again?”

He huffs. “We will meet, in a while. You are not supposed to die today, they sent someone to shoot you down and I came to stop them. You’re welcome.”

“Right,” Napoleon says, slowly, mentally trying to wager the chances that he’s been hallucinating this whole time and ending up just—laughing internally. Rather hysterically too. “From the future.”

“ _Yes_ ,” Mr Russian and Insane insists, like _Napoleon_ is the one being difficult. “It will make sense someday. Now, just stop _moving_.”

Napoleon stills. His mind doesn’t.

He supposes he should be thankful for the distraction, at least, because he spends the rest of his torture session going back and forth between being _certain_ that he’s hallucinating and wondering _but what if_.

A lot is now possible that people would have thought completely _crazy_ two decades ago, what if he is actually in the hands of someone who came from the future to save his life?

Which, by the way, flattering.

Or maybe not: the man doesn’t seem to like him _that_ much and he supposes that someone getting killed before their time would cause quite a bit of trouble. But still.

Also to consider: he called himself his _friend_ , which probably means that they are colleagues in decent enough terms, does this mean that Napoleon has escaped Sanders’ clutches and was recruited by the Soviets? Because he doesn’t have any particular sympathy for the Russians, but he can’t deny that the thought of Sanders all red in the face and spluttering at his betrayal is making him _giddy_.

If he did defect, that mental image would probably be 50% of the reasoning behind it.

Too bad that he’s probably hallucinating—though it all feels pretty damn real. And there’s something fixing his shoulder alright. And it’s not _him_ , alright, he can _see_ his hands, they are on his lap and he can flex his fingers—he would need to be _really_ delirious to be imagining this.

He's pretty sure he is not that far gone. Probably. Really. Almost positive.

“Done,” the man eventually announces, and Napoleon finally unclenches his jaw, after who knows how long. He doesn’t dare rolling his shoulders or straightening his back, but he does feel like he’s slept in the most uncomfortable position of his whole life and came out of it thoroughly exhausted.

“Finally,” he remembers to answer, blinking to keep himself from closing his eyes and falling asleep right on that chair. He would fall over and faceplant on the floor, it would _hurt_.

Still, he wants to _sleep_.

Maybe he said some of that out loud, because next thing he knows Mr Russian is helping him up and then easing him on the ground, making a ball out of his ruined jacket so he can at least pretend to be comfortable.

Napoleon doesn’t much care, really: there are black spots at the edge of his vision and everything hurts and he’s _tired_ , he doesn’t even care that his head is so full of questions it might just burst, or that he didn’t get the man’s name and he might have made him up—

“Don’t let the possessed doll eat my soul,” he remembers to say, grabbing a fistful of what he’s pretty sure is the man’s jacket and giving him a shake for good measure.

There are few moments of silence. “What?”

“The _doll_ ,” he repeats, because really, it’s creepy. “It was staring at me.”

He isn’t even sure if he got an answer to that.

He wakes up alone, lying on the ground with his jacket as a pillow. It’s definitely ruined, because of all the blood, just like his shirt. Pity.

When he pushes himself up, the world takes a few moments to still, his head throbbing just as much as his shoulder and arm, and his hip protesting against supporting his weight against the floor for however many hours he slept.

He’s still in the back of the shop with the creepy doll. He searches for it with his eyes, only to find it turned away from him. Uh. Spooky.

Or maybe not, if he didn’t hallucinate the Russian man who, he remembers it pretty clearly, dragged him out of the street and patched him up. He also remembers talks of being his friend from the future, though. And there is literally no reason for a Russian stranger who clearly knew what he was doing to walk in the middle of a failed op and save his life.

Maybe he bugged him. He should check, and preferably get rid of his clothes before he goes anywhere. It’s not like he has any _spares_ , though.

He probably hallucinated him. He wouldn’t put it past himself to hallucinate an handsome man while he somehow drags himself to the back of a random shop, breaks in and patches himself up with what he finds. He’s done it before, admittedly minus the hallucination part.

It's—possible.

By the time he’s back on his feet and he gets his hands on a phone to contact Sanders – who seems relieved to hear from him and doesn’t waste any time letting him know that he figured he’d made a run for it, which is totally unfair and offensive –, he almost has himself convinced that he made up the handsome Russian man playing nurse. Almost.

It's not like he can verify anyway, without a name.

A little over one year later, he is tasked with an extraction in East Berlin. His target is a young German mechanic who’s unfortunate – or lucky – enough to have a father relevant to many countries’ interests, and she ends up at the wheel while being chased by the Russian spy who has been following him around since he set foot in East Berlin.

Napoleon takes a mental note to brief Sanders on what a ‘simple extraction’ is supposed to entail.

Since he has been left on foot, Napoleon doesn’t expect the Russian to start chasing them. He _definitely_ doesn’t expect him to grab the back of the car and attempt to stop it, and damn, now he’s just about as fascinated as he is worried.

When he manages to take a good look at his face, there’s a tingle of familiarity before he pieces the memories together.

“We’re struggling here. Why don’t you take a shot at him?”

Napoleon keeps staring, thinks of firm hands holding him up, exasperated blue eyes, gentle fingers running through his hair while he was hardly conscious enough to be sure that he wasn’t imagining it and _I am that. Your friend_.

“Somehow,” he says, a smile pushing at the corner of his mouth. “It just doesn’t seem like the right thing to do.”

**Author's Note:**

> This story is part of the [LLF Comment Project](https://longlivefeedback.tumblr.com/llfcommentproject), which was created to improve communication between readers and authors. This author invites and appreciates comments, including: 
> 
>   * Short comments
>   * Long comments
>   * Questions
>   * “<3” as extra kudos
>   * Reader-reader interaction
> 

> 
> If you don’t want a reply, for any reason, feel free to sign your comment with “whisper” and I will appreciate it but not respond!


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